


Enter Patroclus, Stage Left

by St_Salieri



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: First Kiss, Humor, Light Angst, M/M, Post-Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-13
Updated: 2015-03-13
Packaged: 2018-03-17 17:24:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3537803
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/St_Salieri/pseuds/St_Salieri
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>According to the wisdom of the internet, the behavior of Captain America's shield cannot be explained.  According to the wisdom of Bucky Barnes, the rest of the world is a bunch of morons.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Enter Patroclus, Stage Left

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by the most recent [Age of Ultron trailer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAUoeqvedMo). There are no trailer or movie spoilers in the fic, but just in case the part of the trailer where my inspiration came from is listed in the author's note at the end.
> 
> This is my first time writing in this fandom, and I'm very excited. Comments are welcome!
> 
> Also, I now have a [tumblr](http://stsalieri.tumblr.com/) as well.

 

 

According to the wisdom of the internet, the behavior of Captain America's shield cannot be explained. According to the wisdom of Bucky Barnes, the rest of the world is a bunch of morons.

For decades, little real footage existed of Cap actually using his shield in action. A few grainy seconds from a newsreel of the Captain hurling his shield had been preserved after the war ended, but historians were generally forced to rely on the testimony of the other soldiers for evidence of Steve Rogers' fighting abilities.

The problem was that all tales grew taller in the telling as the years passed, and those who would know best - the surviving members of the Howling Commandos - were notoriously tight-lipped about everything Cap-related. Members of the 107th told fantastic tales of an unbreakable disk - heavier than it looked, although no one would admit to ever actually picking it up - that flew for unbelievable distances with deadly force and accuracy.

A rare interview with Dum Dum Dugan in the late 60's raised more questions than it answered, possibly because he was drunk at the time of said interview.

"It's that Howard Stark," he'd muttered, laying his finger against the side of his nose and giving a bleary nod. "I heard it was made of vibranium, and that stuff just ain't natural. Not that it matters, though. Could have been made of goddamn tin foil and Cap still would have worked his magic, bless him. Now where's that whiskey I asked for?"

The rest of the interview degenerated into a bout of maudlin reminiscence, and was generally considered by historians to be somewhat less than reliable.

Attempts over the years to find out details of the construction of the shield were thwarted, first by Stark and Carter, and later by SHIELD in an official capacity. In the end, most legitimate students of the history of Captain Rogers believed that the capabilities of the shield itself were highly exaggerated, most likely as a deliberate action of the army to increase the mythos of Captain America during the war and the years following. That the shield itself existed in some form there was no doubt, but that it was capable of deflecting bullets without so much as a dent, or breaking through iron locks with a single blow? Ridiculous. A few die-hards insisted that there was truth to the wild tales of the soldiers of the 107th, but most shook their heads wisely and lectured on the fog of war and the difficulty of interpreting primary sources.

Decades passed, and Captain America woke up. And suddenly history was turned on its ear.

 

 

********************

 

Bucky entered the vast training space that Stark had set up near the upper floors of the tower that most of the Avengers - and Avengers-adjacent, in his case - were calling home these days. Above the padded floor the ceiling soared a good four stories overhead, perfect for whatever the situation called for, whether it was target practice with moving projectiles or brawling with some of the flying robots Stark had designed for training purposes.

Bucky might have taken a small, secret bit of delight in destroying them as quickly as possible, mostly because it made Stark yelp at how much time and money he'd put into building the damn things.

Natasha was fiddling with her wrist guards and gave him a nod that he returned politely. He could be polite. It was a thing people did.

In truth, Natasha was one of the only people he honestly felt a true politeness toward; he would even categorize it as "fondness", if he could be sure that he remembered what that emotion felt like. Not that he disliked the rest of the Avengers - although Stark came close on his worst days - but there was something to be said for a past based on attempts to kill each other. It cut through the bullshit pretty quickly, especially because Bucky was pretty sure that she was one of the few who could actually take him down. In fact, he trusted her to do so if necessary, and that trust was a pretty heady thing. Friendships had been based on less.

He sat down on the bench next to her and reached down to tighten the lacings on his boots. Natasha bumped his shoulder.

"Ready for this?"

It was an all-purpose question. _How are you feeling? Is your head in the game? Any latent homicidal tendencies you want to let me know about before we get started?_ He nodded.

"Ready," he said in reply, heading over to the main doors to turn on the "Warning: Occupied" light that hung in the hallway. For good measure, he threw the main locks as well. It was only a week ago that _someone_ \- not naming names, but their initials were "Clint Barton" - had nearly had his fool head removed from his body by Steve's shield because he'd been too busy using his phone to post a picture of his dog to Instagram to pay attention to the warning lights.

For Bucky, the fact that Steve would have entirely blamed himself if anything had happened was the worst part of the incident. He still wasn't speaking to Barton about it, just on principle. But given that he didn't speak to Barton much to begin with, he wasn't sure that the other man had noticed anything.

And speaking of Steve....

While Bucky had been setting the locks, Steve had come out of the locker room dressed in a loose jumpsuit, the harness that held his shield strapped around his shoulders. He nodded at Natasha and gave Bucky a quirky smile that Bucky found himself returning. It was an expression he didn't seem capable of making around anyone else, and his face felt strangely plastic, as if it was something his muscles had had to relearn. He glanced over at Natasha and saw her watching him with an expression that might almost be called soft, and his face fell into its usual scowl.

"What?" he barked.

She shook her head in amusement. "I didn't say anything," she said, turning to Steve. "So, Cap, you all set?"

Steve glanced between her and Bucky and nodded, tightening the straps on his fingerless gloves and reaching back to unhook the shield.

"Are you going to give me a hint as to what I'm up against?" he asked plaintively.

"Now where would the fun be in that?" she murmured, pressing a button on the unit she wore around her wrist.

High above them, several doors opened in the walls and ceilings, and a stream of small drones flew out. They scattered and hovered at different levels above the ground, dozens of them filling the air space in the vast room and making soft electrical noises. Blue lights shone from a small bulb at the bottom of some of the drones, red lights from others.

"Okay," Steve muttered, spreading his legs and planting his feet firmly on the floor with the shield held in front of him. He eyed the drones warily and yet out a yelp when one of the ones behind him shot out a laser bolt that hit the back of his leg. He whirled around and scowled at both Bucky and Natasha. "Seriously?"

"Not enough to do any damage," Natasha said. "Just enough to keep you on your toes." She gave him a twisted smile that had Bucky very glad that it was directed at someone other than him. "Think you can handle it?" she challenged.

Steve narrowed his eyes, then gave an answering smirk and dove and rolled into the middle of the room, narrowly missing the laser bolt that hit the mat with a small hiss where he had just been standing. And then he was on the move, not pausing for an instant, and Bucky couldn't take his eyes off of the way that he ran the perimeter of the room in a series of zig-zags and dives and midair spins. It was unbelievably fluid, and Bucky found himself holding his breath as he watched. Steve had always been quick and powerful after the serum that had turned him into something other than an ordinary human, but during the war he had moved as if his body was one step ahead of him and he was still figuring out what it could do. This was something else entirely. He had clearly been training in different styles of martial arts since he had awoken from the ice, and he now moved with a catlike grace that was otherworldly in someone of his size. He had the command of someone who was in complete control of his own body and knew exactly how powerful it was. It was breathtaking to watch, and Bucky stopped trying to fit his still fractured memories of Steve-that-was to the man in front of him and just enjoyed the show.

Steve had been keeping his shield up and eyes on the drones, using his trip around the room for observation purposes only - "Good," Bucky muttered under his breath - before he hurled the shield at a group of the drones hovering nearby. They scattered, as Bucky expected them to, and the shield ricocheted off the wall to hit a different drone dead center. It fell to the floor and let out a quavery "beep", red light dimming and dying.

Diving to catch the shield on rebound and spinning away to avoid another laser bolt, Steve flipped in midair and tossed the shield again. And then it was truly on, and several more drones died a quick death as they were batted out of the air or had their own lasers turned against them by the shield. Eventually, Steve hit one of the blue drones. Instead of falling to the ground, it gave an angry beep and shook itself before splitting into five more identical drones.

"Hey!" Steve said, out of breath, and Bucky could feel Natasha's smirk without even looking at her.

"Oh, didn't I tell you?" she said, and butter wouldn't have melted in her mouth. "The reds are hostiles, and the blues represent civilians. You have to protect them."

Steve barely had time to throw her an incredulous glance. "Son of a...." he muttered, then gave a mighty running leap and collected several of the blue drones under his shield where they had been about to be annihilated by a red one.

"He's good," Natasha muttered ten minutes later, keeping a sharp eye on the surviving drones, more blue now than red. "But you knew that, didn't you?"

"Hell yeah," Bucky said, feeling a strange sort of pride, as if it was his own body careening through space with such effortless grace. He bared his teeth and gave Natasha a feral grin. "Let's see if he's good enough."

At Natasha's nod, Bucky hurtled his body forward and collided with Steve, sending him hard to the mat. He rolled to his feet and tossed the dropped shield away with his metal arm, sending it across the room.

"Bucky?" Steve panted, grabbing his shoulder with a pained expression and letting out a yell at the laser bolt that caught his arm before he could move away. His features tightened with a sort of frightened sadness - just for a moment, just a split second, but it was enough for Bucky to open his mouth, ready to call out the emergency shutdown code. But then Steve's face cleared in relief, the panicked expression disappearing almost instantly, and he let out a weak laugh. _Shit,_ Bucky thought, the pit of his stomach like ice. Maybe Natasha should have been the one to take him down. But she was standing by the side of the room looking carefully back and forth between the two of them.

"Level up?" Steve asked with a small smile, drawing Bucky's attention back to him and darting from side to side to avoid the lasers of the red drones.

It was an expression Bucky wasn't entirely familiar with - maybe something from one of the video games Sam Wilson had introduced them to a few months ago? - but he understood enough from the context. And he understood that Steve was trying to lighten the mood.

"You think you can handle it, Rogers?" he goaded, flexing the metal fingers of his left hand.

"Bring it," Steve breathed, and then swept Bucky's legs with a reach that shouldn't have been possible as far away as he was standing. Bucky rolled to his feet and dodged Steve's grab, sprinting toward the other end of the room where the shield lay abandoned. He batted a darting blue drone away and heard Steve coming up behind him, bright laugh caught in his throat, and then there was nothing but the kinetic fury and incandescent pain of the dance between them, and it was beautiful.

 

 

********************

 

After Captain America's first public outing with the Avengers during the Battle of New York, the debate over Steve Rogers' abilities was resurrected with a stunning fury. The arguments raged hard over the years that followed, and the events with the Winter Soldier in D.C. did nothing to stem the tide.

Where a single dated newsreel had once stood as the only testimony to the power of Cap's shield, hundreds of videos now spread across the internet, housed on YouTube and Vine and dozens of other locations. Shaky camera vids were posted alongside professional quality high-res videos for anyone to see and study. Numerous professors of physiology and biophysics from dozens of the most prestigious universities in the world begged Captain Rogers to let them study him in person, but he always politely refused. Scientists were, again, forced to study videos of him along with the rest of the general public.

Eventually a few theories about the shield started to gain traction, including, in general order of popularity:

  1. The experimental serum gave Steve Rogers heightened reflexes that allowed him to know exactly where to throw and catch the shield.
  2. The shield was made of the same material as Thor's hammer and "came" when Steve Rogers called it.
  3. Captain Rogers performed on-the-fly complex trigonometric calculations before each throw.
  4. It was all a trick - probably using microscopic remotes programmed by Tony Stark.
  5. Sheer dumb luck
  6. Magnets



The debate was heated at times, and more than one Captain America fanboard had broken up over the arguments between rival factions. (The MetaFilter mods had it listed in their unofficial _MeFi Doesn't Do This Subject Well_ list, and Tumblr Savior was used quite extensively as a means of self-preservation.) Even the academics were not above clinging tightly to their pet theories.

"It should be clear to anyone with eyes that this is not possible without mechanical assistance," Dr. Pradesh - one of the leading proponents of the "remote control theory" - said on a YouTube vid with over two million views. On the screen, he paused an image of Steve Rogers in mid-throw that someone had taken with a camera phone several months previously during that thing with the giant robots. (No one was really sure what had happened there.) "Now, see this shadow beneath the leading edge of the shield? Something is attached there, and based on the size and coloring of the shadow it's metallic in nature. In addition..." He pulled up another still image of Steve, this one from the battle with the Chitauri several years ago. "....this is _clearly_ not the original shield that Captain Rogers was using after his resurrection. The discrepancies are obvious. What is SHIELD trying to hide from us?"

"Nonsense," scoffed Dr. Erson in a debate aired on CNN. "There can be no doubt that this is the same shield, and I find the so-called "evidence" of remote control far-fetched at best. The simplest explanation is usually the correct one. We already have evidence of the existence of an Asgardian material that is somehow programmed to respond to a particular user. Why not assume that the shield is partially composed of the same metal? Of course, I suppose its _possible_ that Captain Rogers performs the mental calculations to know where to throw his shield - after all, the physics isn't _that_ complex, but..." she gave a self-deprecating laugh, "...it would be supremely difficult even for me, and with all due respect, I find it hard to believe that an enlisted man from the 1940's possessed the mental abilities necessary to do so, no matter what kind of experimental treatments he was given."

"Get over yourself!" CapsLostPeggy said in a response post on Tumblr with over 380,000 notes. "Captain America saved this city, and all you do is insult his intelligence? I'm starting a boycott of CNN until they apologize for their bigoted nonsense. Signal boost if you agree!"

Bucky, of course, was aware of all of the leading theories. He considered it his unofficial job to keep track of what people were saying about Steve. And he usually stayed out of the debate, although on occasion he had been known to post a caustic diatribe to Reddit under the anonymous handle of Winters_Revenge_18. Just because he could, and because when his frustrations were high he couldn't deal with both Tony Stark and people being Wrong on the Internet.

He also knew that, if more people were aware of his existence, he would have been hounded for his up-close and personal knowledge of the Secrets Behind the Shield. It gave him a bit of twisted satisfaction to realize that people in general weren't any more intelligent than they had been in the previous century, no matter how much the world had changed. Because, as Bucky knew, the explanation was ridiculously simple:

  1. Superior reflexes (that one was correct, at least)
  2. Hours of practice



And that's all there was to it.

No one who had seen the hours Steve spent in the training room could deny how hard he worked to hone his already amazing natural skills with the shield. Bucky had watched as Steve dove over barriers and blocked shots and hurled with a force that would have torn the shoulder of a lesser man. He'd seen Steve curse Tony Stark for the way he had programmed sudden cross winds to cut through the room at unexpected times, ruining Steve's aim and sending the shield wobbling in an unexpected direction. And he'd stood in front of Steve and used his own metal arm to block shots, over and over, sending Steve scrambling for the ricochet.

After years of use, the shield was an extension of Steve's body. And for Bucky, that's where the main problem lay.

 

 

********************

 

It was a fairly easy job, in the end. The mad scientist of the month hadn't been able to instill his giant salamanders with anything near the level of ferocity he'd expected, and the hundred-foot creatures were content to try to climb the nearest buildings and hang from the electrical transformer poles, blinking dumbly up at the grey sky as the rain began to fall. The things didn't even breathe fire. It was simply a matter of corralling the beasts onto an open bit of beachfront property until Sam could retrieve Dr. Strangelove's reversal serum and return them to their proper sizes.

It was a matter of reducing property damage more than anything else, and it was easy enough for Steve, Tony and Bucky to handle. Which was just as well, considering that Natasha and Clint were out of the country and Thor was currently off the planet. Bruce hadn't even bothered leaving his lab.

Of course, the low stakes hadn't meant that Steve was any less of an idiot.

Steve had hurled his shield at one giant lizard and had to dive out of the way of the foot of another one before he could catch it. Bucky had scrambled after the shield, cursing, and prepared to toss it back to Steve as usual. Of course, Steve - the giant asshole that he was - had scaled the leg of the nearest creature and was holding tightly to its back as it lumbered down the street. When a nearby lizard whipped its tail around, it caught Steve across the chest. Without the shield to absorb the brunt of the impact, he had been thrown to the ground. Bucky had watched, heart in his throat, as the back of Steve's helmet made a sickening crack against the pavement. He had fired several quick shots into the head of the lizard in question - screw the whole "innocent animals" thing, he had his priorities - and raced over just as Steve hauled himself to his feet with a painful grimace. Bucky had glowered and slammed the shield against his chest harder than was strictly necessary.

Steve had winced and taken a step back. "What?"

The bewildered innocence of the question - as if he didn't _know_ , that stupid jerk - had made Bucky see red, and he had turned away before he could smack Steve across the back of the head and probably jar what was left of his brains loose in the process.

After surviving the Red Skull and the Chitauri and the fucking Winter Soldier, Bucky was damned if Captain Goddamn America was going to meet his end at the hands - or paws - of an overgrown newt. After abandoning his shield, no less.

Afterward, the elevator ride in Avenger's Tower was more quiet than usual. Steve - who probably didn't have a bruise on him at that point - was eyeing Bucky as if trying to see inside his brain, and Bucky was staring straight ahead with a glower, unwilling to give him the satisfaction of making eye contact. He slammed his thumb on the button of the thirty-eighth floor a little harder than necessary, grabbed Steve's shield from his hands and followed Tony into one of his labs, leaving Steve behind in the elevator staring at him in bewilderment.

Tony raised an eyebrow as Bucky flung himself into one of the chairs.

"Something I can do for you, Patroclus?"

Bucky wasn't entirely sure of the reference, but he scowled anyway on the assumption that it was an insult. Which, knowing Tony Stark, it probably was. He tossed the shield on a lab bench and gestured to his left arm.

"I think one of the lizards...dripped on me."

Tony peered at the arm with a look of disgust and pried open one of the access panels. "Ugh, yeah. I don't think the warranty covers salamander slime. Here, hang on."

He disappeared into the back room and reemerged with an unmarked bottle. Bucky eyed it with suspicion.

"Designed to cut through biological secretions without harming electronics," Tony said triumphantly. "I designed it myself after that thing with the slugs. Were you here for that? If you weren't, you don't want to know, trust me."

"You've tested it?" Bucky said, holding his arm just out of reach.

"I'm about to," Tony said, spraying the liquid into Bucky's arm and dancing out of reach before Bucky could deck him. "Oh, relax, would you? I'm 100% sure that it works. Well, 98%. 96, maybe, if you take into account the fact that I may have been _slightly_ high when I mixed it up."

Bucky ignored him - usually the safest thing to do, since he was never sure when Tony was deliberately trying to wind him up - and watched in relief as the salamander slime dried up without a trace. He flexed his metal fingers, checking the reflexes, and nodded in satisfaction.

"Thanks," he said grudgingly. It never hurt to be polite, especially since Stark had finally stopped reprogramming JARVIS to play a recording of the Soviet anthem whenever Bucky entered a room.

"Easy fix," Tony said. He grabbed a nearby rag and wiped at his sweaty face, which Bucky knew was a sign that Iron Man's climate control was malfunctioning again. "I'll have to use it on the suit later, so, you know, thanks for being an easy test subject, in the sense of not killing me." He eyed Steve's shield. "Now what's the problem with this little bit of technological marvel?"

Bucky folded his arms across his chest and glared at the shield. "He threw it into a building," he said shortly. "And the pavement. And a couple of those lizards."

"Yeah, he does tend to do that," Tony said absently, picking up the shield and giving it a twirl. He spun it front to back, eyeing both sides carefully, and shrugged. "Well, apart from the paint job needing a touchup - and maybe tightening one of the handles here - it looks fine to me. No dents, no pockmarks, not a goddamn scratch. One thing I'll say for dear ol' dad, he knew what he was doing with the vibranium. Takes a licking and keeps on ticking, just like the good Captain himself."

He looked up shrewdly and caught the way Bucky stiffened. "Which is the real problem, isn't it?" he said more softly.

Bucky scowled and stared at the opposite wall, watching out of the corner of his eye as Stark unearthed a dusty bottle and poured himself a generous slosh of whatever was inside. He poured a second glass and slid it across the table to Bucky, who caught it absently.

"He should know better," Bucky growled, taking a sip of the amber liquid.

"Probably," Tony agreed readily.

"He just...throws it away."

"Well, that sort of is its purpose..." Tony said slowly.

"...like he doesn't even care if he gets it back!" Bucky said in exasperation. "And then he goes rushing off to fight without it, like he's some kind of..."

"Superhero?" Tony finished pointedly. Bucky deflated, because...yeah. "Look, my fellow Metal Man, I get it, okay? He's a self-sacrificing jerk, like just about everyone else in this tower. And it's a tough gig, to care about someone like that. You know, so I've heard."

"I don't..." _care_ , Bucky started to say, but stopped because it would have been obvious lie and he wouldn't have been fooling anyone.

"Yeah, clearly," Tony snorted. "Because the longest conversation you've ever had with me has been an oblique bit of angst on the life and fortunes of Captain Steve Rogers." He picked up the shield and held it out to Bucky. "Here. Now go talk to him, would you? Don't do the thing where you're both moping around each other for weeks again. It bores me and brings Bruce down, and I cannot deal with a weepy Hulk."

Bucky grabbed the shield and managed a grudging nod of thanks, thinking that maybe he hadn't given Tony Stark quite the benefit of the doubt he deserved. Of course, that thought only lasted until he reached the doors and they swished open with the fanfare of horns and the voices of the Red Army Ensemble singing _Soyuz nerushimy respublik svobodnykh..._.

"Screw you, Stark," he muttered as the doors shut behind him and Tony cackled in glee.

The elevator ride to the floor he shared with Steve near the top of the tower was shorter than he needed to get his thoughts together, and he stepped off onto the floor holding the shield in front of him as if expecting a blow.

Steve appeared in front of him, out of uniform and freshly showered. He looked a little sheepish, hunching his shoulders as if that did anything to reduce his ridiculous breadth. He had the apologetic look on his face that Bucky _hated_ , because it was Steve's default "Bucky is upset and I don't know why and need to calm him down" look. Bucky felt his anger flare to life all over again.

"Here," he said tightly, shoving the shield at Steve. "Keep hold if it next time, would you?"

Steve furrowed his brows and studied the shield. "It doesn't look damaged," he said.

"That's not the point!"

Steve propped the shield up against the wall and looked even more bewildered. "Then what is the point?"

"The point is that you don't have the goddamn sense to use the tools you have," Bucky growled, poking Steve hard in the chest with a metal finger. "All that training you do, and you just fling that thing around without thinking! What would have happened if I hadn't been there to pick it up for you, huh?"

"Bucky," Steve tried to say, but Bucky was on a roll.

"You always do this! You leave yourself open, and one day it's going to get you killed! Why do you have to do that, huh? Why do you have to just toss it away like that, drop it in the goddamn river like an idiot?"

"The river?" Steve said in confusion, and Bucky felt his insides turn to ice. Shit. _Shit._ That hadn't come out at all like he'd meant, and now Steve would...Steve would _know_ that he hadn't been able to stop thinking about that day on the helicarrier high above the Potomac when his world ended and began all at once.

Bucky closed his eyes in humiliation.

"Bucky," Steve said softly, and fuck, he knew exactly what Bucky was thinking about. "Hey, Buck, it's okay. We're both okay."

Bucky felt hands cradling his face - large hands, warm, calloused from training, and so so familiar even though they had never touched him in this way before. He opened his eyes to see Steve looking at him determinedly, his dear stupid face so close and his expression so fond that Bucky held his breath and couldn't look away.

And then Steve bent closer and fit his mouth carefully to Bucky's, and...oh.

_Oh._

The kiss was almost chaste, just the warm press of Steve's lips to his, Steve's thumbs sweeping over his cheekbones and fingers carding through the hair that had fallen loose around Bucky's neck during the fight. The tip of Steve's tongue touched Bucky's lower lip as he pulled away, and it was as if an electric jolt shot through Bucky's entire body. He realized that he had grabbed onto Steve's wrists and was holding him tightly enough to bruise, but he couldn't bring himself to pull them away.

"Oh," he said out loud, stupidly, and a smile creased Steve's face.

"Okay?" he said lowly, still cradling Bucky's face. There was a naked, terrified look in his eyes, as if he was standing on the edge of a vast precipice, but he didn't pull back and he didn't let go. He didn't apologize or stammer out an excuse. Instead, he held still and let Bucky look at the fear and hope in his eyes.

It didn't surprise Bucky at all. Steve had always been the braver one.

"Yeah," he gasped, and pulled Steve close. The second kiss was deeper, hungrier, and Bucky _knew_ this was their second kiss because there was no way in hell he would have forgotten this, no matter what mess HYDRA had made of his mind and memories. Steve was solid against him, a bulwark of strength for Bucky to hold to, and he kissed Bucky with a single-minded determination that left him shaking, as if this was the most important thing Steve could ever think of doing.

To tell the truth, Bucky couldn't think of a single thing more important himself.

Bucky was gratified to find that they were _both_ shaking by the time they finally pulled apart, and Steve let out a wobbly laugh as he wound his arms around Bucky's waist.

"Hi," he said with a dumb grin that Bucky mirrored immediately, reaching up to smooth his fingers over the fine wrinkles near Steve's eyes, just because he could now.

"I'm still mad at you, Rogers," he muttered, because it wouldn't do the little shit any good to let his power over Bucky go to his head. But he couldn't stop smiling, and he had the feeling it might have dulled the impact of his words somewhat.

"Uh huh," Steve said easily, leaning forward to nuzzle his nose against Bucky's. "You watch my back like I watch yours. You're my shield, Buck."

It was such a cheesy thing to say, so stupid and heartfelt and utterly _Steve Rogers_ , and Bucky felt his heart warm even as he swatted Steve's shoulder and then pulled him into a fierce hug. He buried his face in Steve's broad shoulder and held him tight, tight.

"You'd better believe it," he croaked. "So play nice, or I'll go online and tell everyone that you do it all with magnets."

Steve cackled and pulled Bucky further into the apartment, leaving the shield with its star bulls-eye propped up against the wall behind them.

 

 

 

 

End

**Author's Note:**

> This was inspired by Natasha's "always picking up after you boys" line in the trailer when she collects Steve's shield. I got to thinking about how Steve is always throwing that thing around, and by all rights it should have gone missing years ago.
> 
>  **EDIT 3/19/2015:** Except that I've just seen the *latest* [Age of Ultron TV spot](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0WM915QsOyI) and it looks like magnets _might be involved after all_ with the most recent version of the shield? I...don't quite know what to do with myself right now!


End file.
